 Today we're in chapter 8 here in the book of Acts. We're going to look at verses 26 through 40, and what I'll do is I'll begin at verse 26 here in Acts 8. I'll read to verse 29, and we'll get into our study. Acts chapter 8, beginning at verse 26, reading to verse 29. Now an angel of the Lord spoke to Philip saying, arise and go toward the south along the road which goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza. This is desert. So he arose and went, and behold a man of Ethiopia, a eunuch of great authority under Candace, the queen of the Ethiopians who had charge of all her treasury, and had come to Jerusalem to worship, was returning, and sitting in his chariot he was reading Isaiah the prophet. Then the spirit said to Philip, go near and overtake this chariot. So as we begin, let's remind ourselves of a few things because as we do so it'll help us to understand what is taking place here in Acts chapter 8. We need to remember that the Lord Jesus Christ had given a commission to the disciples. It's been called the Great Commission, and he had given this commission to the disciples. He had said to them in Matthew chapter 28 verses 19 and 20, go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you, and lower them with you always, even to the end of the age. So he had said to them that they were to go out and to take this message to all nations. In Acts chapter 1 verse 8 he had given us greater insight into this command when he had said in Acts 1-8, you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and Samaria, and to the end of the earth. And so you are to go out and you're to take it throughout the whole face of the earth. But you cannot do it with just good intentions. You need to take this message in the power of the Spirit. And so there's a lot of, I think there's a lot of wasted energy today in the church where we try to do the work of ministry without the power of the Holy Spirit. And so when Jesus said to his disciples, you're going to take this message out, he also said you're going to need the power to be able to do it. So with God's word and God's power the disciples were intended by God to evangelize the world and that's what they've been doing. You see after Pentecost had occurred, as we've seen already as we've been studying here in the book of Acts, after Pentecost the disciples had shared that gospel, they had done so in the city of Jerusalem. And then we noticed that when persecution arose they began to scatter and they scattered through Judea and into Samaria. Now we see the gospel beginning to go to the end of the earth. And what we see here is Philip sharing the gospel with a high ranking official from Ethiopia. Now Philip is the only one ever spoken of in the New Testament as an evangelist. And though we may not hold a position of evangelist, even so we are still called by God to do the work of an evangelist. And so even though Philip, and we're going to see the work of evangelism done here by the way in just a moment, but even though we are not necessarily part of that that gifting will say of evangelists, yet we all have been given opportunity in the Lord to proclaim this message of Jesus Christ. One of the things that the Lord was laying on my heart today as I was preparing the study was to remind myself as well as all of us that this gospel message that he's given to us is the only message that God has given to mankind whereby a man must embrace by faith in order to be saved. And I believe very strongly that what's happening in unfortunately in many places today throughout the United States and the world is we have forgotten the things that God has called us to do, the first things. He had said take this message and make disciples and do it in the power of the Spirit. But what is happening today in many quarters is we're more desirous of filling church buildings than we are with filling people of God. We have a lot of full pews with empty people and what God has called us to do is make disciples to teach people to observe all things that Jesus commanded, to teach them the A to the Z of the message of the gospel. There are a lot of people today though who embrace that message on a personal level, but who fail to realize that they are also intended by God to communicate that same message. The message that saved you is the message you give to others. And so sometimes we're a little afraid to do that. Sometimes we're a little nervous. Maybe we're shy by personality. There are some people who aren't shy. There are some people who are just so outspoken and so comfortable speaking in front of people. And then there are others like myself who are really reserved and it really takes the Holy Spirit to say get out there and speak because it isn't something you naturally want to do. It's been stated that the number one fear that people carry is the fear of speaking in front of people. It takes the Holy Spirit to speak to your heart, to give you a message, change a life and a love for others so that you take this message that was given to you, embraced by faith by you and taken to others. So we need to know that God is given to us in His Holy Spirit and in His Word all the power and all the message we'll ever really know, need to know. And it's that message that changes people's lives. I remember how that the Lord spoke through Paul to a young pastor by the name of Timothy and what Paul through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit wrote to Timothy is something that all of us can embrace. He had said to him in 2 Timothy chapter 4 verse 5 to Timothy he said, be watchful in all things, endure affliction and then he went on to say this, do the work of an evangelist and fulfill your ministry. Timothy wasn't necessarily an evangelist but he was called by God to do the work of an evangelist, to go out and proclaim that message, to live that message as well as to give that message. And so we all in one form or another already do the work of an evangelist. It just depends on what you're telling people they should embrace or they should believe or they should even do. Here we go. I was looking at this today. Maybe I was wasting my time. I don't know. We'll find out in a few minutes. We'll see how you respond to this. But I was thinking about that, you know, the fact that all of us are very familiar with evangelists. And I've done this before, bear with me, but you'll see I'm going to take you in a different direction a bit today than before. But I've said this to you before. I've said who is the greatest evangelist in the world? You know, who is the greatest evangelist? And I've asked, I've said this before, who does the work of evangelism? Who is most productive? Who is most continuous? Who is the greatest? And if I said that to a church group as I do this evening, you know, people may use the names of evangelists like Billy Graham or Louise Palau or Greg Laurie, whom God is using in tremendous ways to take this message throughout the world. And a lot of times my mind is restricted to those kinds of things. And so I'll say, oh, the greatest evangelist because I take the word evangelism and I consider it in its biblical sense to be the proclamation of good news of salvation. And thus that's what I'm going to do. So I'm going to say if somebody asks me who's the best known evangelist or the most effective evangelist, then I'm necessarily going to say, oh, well, you know, to this day, Billy Graham's books and his TV program and all are still going out. So Billy Graham, but this is interesting. The most effective evangelists, I took this from a page called Search Engine Land. You ready? Who are the most effective evangelists? Google, the almighty Google. There are 34,000 searches on Google per second. That, I think that got past you. 34,000 searches a second, a second. Okay, good. You responded, I'm glad. That breaks down to 2 million searches per minute, 121 million per hour, 3 billion per day, 88 billion per month. That's evangelism. Yahoo, 3200 searches per second, 194,000 per minute, 12 million per hour, 280 million per day, 8.4 billion per month. Bing, I don't even know what Bing, you know what I'm saying? Bing, I don't want that. 927 searches a second, 56,000 per minute, 3 million per hour, 80 million per day, 2.4 billion per month. Another page said, Twitter has 19 billion searches per month, 600 tweets per second. Facebook has 1.79 billion users with status updates at the rate of 700 a second. When you're looking at this mass communication, that is incredible evangelism. Ideas, beliefs, opinions that are being spread at an enormous rate, saturating people's minds with information. When you look at movies, just movies, in 2016, total ticket sales for movies were 1,334,595,859. That's a lot of movies. This made 11,250,646,490 in revenue. Why did I bring movies in? Because movies are the way that the common culture is established. What you watch on TV or watch at a movie theater is what helps to mold your way of looking at life. And that's how so many people have been brainwashed into believing things that the Bible teaches specifically against. You know, the average American watches five hours of television a day, but that's, you know, not including the fact that many are using Hulu and Netflix and a variety of other outlets. Nielsen says that more than 90% of Americans listen to the radio daily, and from talk shows to music programs, the influence is staggering. And so is the revenue, because when you're spending all that money that you pay for a Super Bowl ad for 30 seconds, you are betting the house that somebody is going to go and buy your product. You know, one of the things about the world is they don't invest in things that don't return. The businesses that have no return just go out of business, right? And so Jesus gave us some insight into how the world values certain things when he said in Luke 16, verse 8 that the sons of this world are more shrewd in their generation than the sons of light. He's saying that the world knows how to evangelize. The world knows what they want. It is interesting. I have been to a variety of countries throughout the world in ministry, and I have gone to some of the most impoverished places on the face of the earth. And yet you'll be in a place in India that is incredibly impoverished, and you're going to find Levi's being sold in some outlet. You're going to see that. You're going to go to the Philippines and some of the most impoverished areas, and you're going to see Coke and McDonald's being sold. You're going to see it throughout the world. I have seen the American products sold in places you wouldn't believe anybody had the money to afford it. And yet they invest all of this money. The most cars that are being sold by General Motors are in China now. And I wonder how many people in China can really afford one of those cars. And yet there they are selling their product, making their product, because they are evangelizing. So be very careful not to think that evangelization just occurs through the church. Evangelization occurs every moment of every day. You climb in your car. You turn on your radio. You are being evangelized. You listen to secular radio, secular talk show, secular music. You are being evangelized. That is what is taking place. You are being given a mindset. You are being told certain things if they belong to you will make you happy. So you have to eat crazy chicken because that'll make you happy. Right? You got to eat a certain hamburger, wear a certain clothing. You need to go to certain places because these things will make you happy. Where did we get the idea that we would get permanent satisfaction from material things? We didn't get it from the Word of God. We got it from the world. And even the church itself today has been transformed from a place that is filled with the worship of God and the Word of God to an entertainment center where if a Christian is not satisfied with the product, they will find another place that satisfies them. I know of one church in particular that actually closes the doors for the service at a certain time to create anticipation for the people who are standing in line to get in for the next service. It's all marketing. It's not that you're getting in to hear a message that will make you walk out saying, I want to be more like Christ. I want more of the love of the Spirit and the power of God. It's more a place where you come out saying, man, that was great. I really enjoyed myself. What a personality. Did you see the stage? Unbelievable. That's what's taking place in the church today. We need a revival, guys. We need to wake up. We need to get on fire once again for Jesus Christ. We need that. We really, this nation needs that. There's just no doubt about that. You see, the most influential evangelists are getting their product out. And what you value the most is what is easiest to speak about. And it's true. Jesus said it, didn't he? In Matthew 12, 34, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. That's a fact. And I've said this to you before. I'll say it again. It bears repetition at this moment and I'll continue on. But I have a friend of mine. I'll see him tomorrow. His name is Bill. I've been mentoring Bill and meeting with him now for several years. He had, he was the one who was instrumental in kidnapping me to go and hear the gospel to get saved. We went in the military together. I've known him since we were in kindergarten. And so he was, he was more closer to me than a brother. He was dearer to me than any friend I had for many years. And we lost contact for many, many years. I re-encountered him. He got right with the Lord. And I've been mentoring him now for several years, once a month. And when I talk to Bill and share with Bill, and I've traveled with Bill, I was in the military with Bill and all of that. We've had these conversations about ministry and Bill will come and he'll do it. He does it almost every time. He'll look at me when we meet. He'll do it tomorrow. And he'll say to me, now, well, what's your wife's name? He'll tell me that. Now, now, what's your wife's name? And then he'll laugh. He always does that. And he said, you know, Dave, do you realize that you mentioned Marie, almost every message, because he listens to me on K wave. He listens every day to me on K wave. And he'll come and repeat things he heard. And he does that to me. Now, what's your wife's name? Are you married? And I'll say, why do you say that? Because you mentioned her. And you know, this is a fact. I don't realize I do that. I don't realize I do that. I just do. Why? Because out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. The thing you value most is going to be so out in front. So many people say, how can I learn to evangelize? Here's your secret. Ready? Fall in love with the Lord. You fall in love with Jesus. You're going to talk about him. You won't even realize you are. You won't even realize you are. But you will talk about him. You will. Why? Because he's in your heart. Because he motivates your speech. You know, we can help you to memorize scripture. We can help you to learn certain ways to communicate and give away your faith. We do have classes here that help to prepare people to do that. Street witnessing teams and things like that. But the bottom line, guys, fall in love with the Lord. Fall in love with Jesus Christ. Meditate on his word. Pray. Seek him. Ask God to fill you with his spirit and say, Lord, give me an opportunity. I'd like to share about you and watch the doors begin to open up. And so that's what we're looking at here with a man by the name of Philip. Philip is revealing what he values the most. And what it is, is it's sharing the love of God with a spiritually unsatisfied Ethiopian eunuch. And so what we have here in verse 26 is this, an angel of the Lord spoke to Philip saying, Arise and go toward the south along the road, which goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza. This is desert. So he arose and went, behold, a man of Ethiopia, a eunuch of great authority under Candice, the queen of the Ethiopians, who had charge of all her treasury and had come to Jerusalem to worship, was returning and sitting in his chariot. He was reading Isaiah the prophet. The spirit said to Philip, go near and overtake this chariot. And so the angel of the Lord speaks to Philip, arise and go toward the south. If you were looking at a map and you're looking at the city of Jerusalem and you began to go to the west and then you would go down south, that's heading towards what is called Gaza. And he's going to a city that was at one time when the cities of the Philistines and he's moving in that direction. So he's going to the west and he's going down south. And so he's going into that area and the Holy Spirit, well, the angel of the Lord is instructing him to go. Now it's interesting to note that we looked in chapter eight last time and there's a revival that is taking place in this area called Samaria. And yet Philip is being instructed to go into the desert. So obediently he arises and he goes, but he could have been reluctant. But God was after someone. It's interesting how the Lord works things out to reach those who have a need. We think of the time that Jesus went to a city of Samaria to speak to a woman at a well. We think of the time when Jesus went into the city of Jericho and there he encountered and ministered to a man by the name of Zacchaeus. Earlier an angel of the Lord had opened the prison doors so that Peter and John could preach the gospel and they were commanded by an angel in Acts 5 20 to go stand in the temple and speak to the people all the words of this life. And so now the Lord has another appointment and this is with an Ethiopian eunuch, an official. Now the angel of the Lord spoke to him according to verse 26 and said, go toward the south. So that's the divine direction for the purpose of presenting the gospel to someone. And he traveled southwest from Jerusalem to Gaza, which is desert. Now interestingly, Philip had been used by the Lord to preach in Samaria and many had come to faith in Christ. But there was a man there by the name of Simon the sorcerer and Simon the sorcerer had also heard. It may be that Philip could be reluctant to preach after an experience like that because when we looked at Simon the sorcerer, he was not converted at all but tried to buy the power of the Holy Spirit and received great condemnation and Philip could somehow feel a bit responsible for what had happened with Simon in that he had preached to him and Simon the sorcerer had even been water baptized and all. And yet what does the Lord do here? Instead of saying, oh where's your discernment? You shouldn't have done that. He actually just commissions him to continue and he says, no this is what I want you to do because he's strengthening him against becoming afraid to preach. And as this is happening, notice verse 27, it speaks in this way, behold a man of Ethiopia, a eunuch of great authority under Candice the Queen. Now Ethiopia in that day was a large kingdom located south of Egypt. The Greeks and the Romans referred to Ethiopia as the uttermost part of the earth. Remember with me the commission that Jesus had given. You receive power after that the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and unto the uttermost parts of the earth. Ethiopia was regarded by Romans and Greeks as the uttermost part of the earth. What's interesting here and let me give you a couple of things that will help you to see what's taking place. In verse 27, it speaks of this man of Ethiopia, speaks of him as a eunuch. I'll explain a couple things about that in a moment. But notice he's a man of great authority under Candice the Queen of the Ethiopians. Now when you read Candice there, you may think that's her name, Queen Candice. But Candice is not her name. Candice is what is called a hereditary title. It's her title. Power in Ethiopia was actually wielded by a woman and it was the Queen Mother. And that's what Candice refers to. The word Candice speaks of a great or a royal woman. And so this is what's taking place. This is a man of Ethiopia, a eunuch who's under the authority of Candice the Queen of the Ethiopians. And notice what he does in verse 27. He has charge of all her treasury. So he's minister of finance. That's who he is. He's a man of great authority, the minister of finance for Ethiopia. Now what we want to note for a moment here is that he's very powerful. But we also want to see that he's also very empty. And he's obviously searching. You know, he had come to Jerusalem to worship, seeking to know the true and the living God. But he was returning to Ethiopia spiritually empty. It says it. It says he had come who had charge of all her treasury and had come to Jerusalem to worship and was returning. And sitting in his chariot, he was reading Isaiah the prophet. And the spirit said to Philip, go near and overtake this chariot. So when it says that he was reading the book of Isaiah, Isaiah the prophet, the word reading there has the connotation of not reading simply to himself. He was actually reading out loud. And so Philip could hear him as he's reading. And he's reading in the book of Isaiah. Now he was a eunuch. Let me share with you a little bit about that because we don't use that word very often anymore. I used to call my friends that, but that wasn't a nice thing to say. In scripture, eunuch can be used in two different ways. One, as a eunuch could be speaking of a man who was a high official, you see that in the book of Genesis chapter 39 where Joseph had been, there was an attempted seduction of Joseph and the husband to the woman is a eunuch. He was a married man. So the word could be used as a man who was capable of being married. But most commonly the word eunuch spoke of what is called an emasculated man. An emasculated man is a proper way of speaking of an individual who has been castrated. And so the eunuchs could be emasculated and many were because very often the eunuch was placed in charge of the king's harem. And so to make sure that he didn't have relations with the wives and women, they would castrate them. That is not a job most men would have wanted. But they were eunuchs. Jesus speaks of eunuchs. He says there are eunuchs that are born eunuchs. There are eunuchs who are made eunuchs by other men. And then there are eunuchs, he said, who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of God's sake. And so there is even a spiritual reality of somebody who is an unmarried man and it can be used in that form also. This individual was more than likely one who had been emasculated. And that would mean that he would not be allowed to become a full convert to the Jewish religion. In Deuteronomy 23 verse 1 it says, no one who has been emasculated by crushing or cutting may enter the assembly of the Lord. They would not allow a eunuch to be a full member of the congregation of Israel. The best that this man could be if he was a physical eunuch was that he could be what is called a God-fearer. A God-fearer is an individual who holds to the beliefs of the nation of Israel but never submits to full incorporation into the Jewish faith because normally if a Gentile male wanted to be part of the Jewish faith they would receive the right of circumcision. But there are those who are called God-fearers, we'll see one in chapter 10 of the book of Acts, who never submitted to circumcision and thus were never welcomed into the the nation of Israel as a full convert. Eunuchs could not become a full convert because the law forbids it. So the best that this man can be described of as would be a God-fearer. And as we've seen he's been in Jerusalem, he's been there to worship. But his time there in the city of Jerusalem didn't satisfy his hunger. When you consider the spiritual state of the nation at that time it's natural that he would leave unsatisfied. But in the midst of all of this God was preparing the minister of finance for salvation. You see instead of losing interest he continues to evidence spiritual hunger and God saw the hunger of this man. And God sent Philip to share the gospel with him. This is one of those divine appointments that sometimes you have where it's just obviously orchestrated by the Lord for this conversation to take place. It isn't something that that you started on purpose that you wanted to do that you tried to manipulate. It was a natural event where the Lord just had you. You were moving from this area here and somebody who's moving from this area there and you're going in two different directions and then bang you connect. And before you know it you're talking. And as you're speaking you're sharing. As you're sharing the person is interested and sometimes you have the privilege of leading them to faith in Christ. And it's that divine appointment. That's what we have here taking place. You see God saw the hunger of this man and God sent Philip to share with him. In Jeremiah 29 verses 12 and 13 it reads, then shall you call upon me and you shall go and pray to me I will listen to you and you shall seek me and find me when you search for me with all of your heart. This man is reading Isaiah. He's been there in Jerusalem. He's left unsatisfied. He's reading the Bible and as he's reading it out loud Philip hears him and notice in verse 29 how it says, the Spirit said to Philip go near and overtake the chariot. The Spirit prompts his heart to move and he does. God help me. God help us to be more sensitive to the movement of the Spirit. When the Holy Spirit says go share with them. Because sometimes I've said, no that's not the Spirit. That's just me. Now go share with them. No that's just me. And then it turns out that no it was the Holy Spirit. Well here what we have is God has prepared the heart of an Ethiopian to receive and he's prepared a man to present and that's what's going to take place here. And so look what happens with Philip in verse 30. Philip ran to him. He was so moved and so quick. He said, here we go. You know that by the way that reminds me of when I first got saved. When I basically made a notation here to remind myself Philip ran to him. When we first got saved my friends and I, we really believed the gospel. We really did. We really did. We really believed it. I believed that God is God. That God said his son. That Jesus Christ died in a cross. I really believed that. I believed that the Holy Spirit would live in me if I asked him to. I believed those things that he would give me power. I believed that he would use me for his glory because the Bible says so. Why wouldn't? Why would God lie to me? Why wouldn't God do those things? That was so commonsensical to me. I mean, it took me a long time to forget to believe the way I used to believe when I was saved. Because when I was first saved I would talk to people and I didn't know very much at all. Once I was blind, now I see. Once I was deaf, now I hear. Once I was lame, now I walk. My friends still think I'm lame but I'm walking with Christ. I had conversations in my early days where I had no clue who I was talking to or what I was talking about other than I knew Jesus Christ. I remember one conversation. I wasn't more than two weeks old in Jesus. I was just learning to read the Bible. And some guy came to the house, my friend Bill's house, and he was doing some work there. I walked up to him and I asked him, are you a believer? Because that's what we would do. Are you a believer? Yes, I am. Oh, you are, really? Cool. He goes, I'm with the church of religious science or something like that. That wasn't that. It was something similar. I'll remember in a moment. It was an Eastern religion. I said, okay, I've never heard of that. What is that? No, I'm two weeks old in Christ. What do I know? I've never even heard of this. Self-realization. I'm with the Self-realization Fellowship. I said, what is that? I don't know. Explain to me. What is that? And he starts telling me that they follow after this particular Indian guru who had come to the United States in the early 1900s. And he starts telling me things about the Self-realization Fellowship. And he said, but what do you believe? What do you believe? He goes, well, we believe all the great prophets. I said, and who are they? And I'm telling you, I'm brand new. I'm a doper. I was saved two weeks earlier. My brain had been incubating in marijuana for a long time. My eyes had just been open. So this is all new to me. So I'm asking him with honesty. I'm saying, what is that? So he starts telling me, we believe in all the great masters, all the ascended masters. And who would that be? Well, that would be Confucius. That would be Buddha. You know, that would be Krishna. That would be Jesus. And I said, no, wait a minute, I got to ask a question. And I wasn't arguing. I was really talking. You say you believe in Jesus? He goes, yes, I do. You do? He says, yes, he's one of your prophets? Yes, he is. Do you believe what he says? Because I'm confused. He goes, of course we believe what he says. I said, now I don't know anything, but I know this, John 14.6. But wait a minute, I said, Jesus said, I am the way, the truth and the life. No man comes to the Father, but by me. Answer me, how can you believe in Jesus who says he's the only way and include Mohammed and include Buddha and include, how do you do that? How do you do that? I want a real answer to that. Because if you say you believe in Jesus and all he said, he said he's the only way. Okay, he said, I don't want to argue. I said, who's arguing? I'm not arguing. I'm wanting you to instruct me. I would like to know how that's possible. You know, people believe things simply because they don't read their Bibles. When you read your Bible, you can't believe that nonsense. You can't. And the reason some Christians are falling into traps of deception is basic bottom line. As simplistic as it may seem, they just don't read the word. They just don't. They just don't. So they're without knowledge of what God's word says. And that's why they're easily deceived. The enemy just casts his hook, his line out there, draws him in, draws him in. And then they walk in, Oh yeah, you know, Jesus is, and then he's the first creation of God or the spirit brother of Lucifer or one of many masters or the last great prophet before Muhammad. And that's how all of the religious systems can seduce even those who claim to know Christ. That's how it works. We need to know Jesus. We need to need the power of the Holy Spirit and the knowledge of his word. And that's what Philip is doing right now. He's running to share this good news with this lost man, ran to him, verse 30, heard him reading the prophet Isaiah, said, Do you understand what you're reading? He said, How can I unless someone guides me? And he asked Philip to come and sit with him. Now that's a great opening. Do you understand what you're reading? This is a great question because the man wouldn't know the meaning. So he says it in verse 31. How can I unless someone guides me? Now Philip was completely conversant with the passage. He was able to provide the answer. You see in Ephesians 4 11 and 12, remember how it says he is the one who gave these gifts to the church, the apostles, prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers. Their responsibility is to equip God's people to do his work, build up the church, the body of Christ. So this evangelist with theological training is doing exactly what God has equipped him to do. You see, the Bible is a closed book to those who don't know the Lord. In 1 Corinthians 2 14, it says people who aren't Christians can't understand these truths from God's spirit. It all sounds foolish to them because only those who have the spirit can understand what the spirit means. So it requires the presentation of God's word and the explanation for people to be saved. You see nature and conscience can make us aware that there's such a thing as a God, but the word reveals him. And that's why we present the word of God. So Philip needed to explain the passage for him to grasp his content. It takes the spirit to draw a person. It takes the Holy Spirit to fill them with the knowledge of salvation and understanding. So the man's response reveals the humility of his heart as well as its hunger. And he invites Philip to be seated with him. Can you imagine how that would have thrilled Philip to have this opportunity to sit down with this guy and to share the gospel with him? So in verse 32, the place in the scripture which he read was this. He was led as a sheep to the slaughter and as a lamb before a shearer is silent. So he opened not his mouth. In his humiliation, his justice was taken away. And who will declare his generation for his life is taken from the earth? So the eunuch answered Philip and said, I ask you, of whom does the prophet say this? Of himself or of some other man? And Philip opened his mouth and beginning at this scripture preached Jesus to him. Now as they went down the road, they came to some water. The eunuch said, see here is water. What hinders me from being baptized? So they had this amazing conversation. And I want you to notice that beginning from that scripture, he was able to give him a picture of the Messiah who was being spoken of and prophesied there in Isaiah 53. So as they're speaking, this is a question by the way that many had been wrestling with in Israel because the question really is, is he speaking of himself or some other man? Because at that time there was discussion concerning what Isaiah was referring to. You see, some believe that this spoke of the nation of Israel. And to this day when you speak to many Jews, rabbis, they will say, well, Isaiah 53 is speaking of the nation of Israel. There are others though who said, no, Isaiah, the prophet, was really speaking concerning himself and the things he had been suffering. But there were still others who thought that the passage was speaking of the Messiah. And so Philip obviously knew who was being spoken of in this passage. And that's why he preached Christ to them, to him. It says in verse 35, he opened his mouth and beginning at this scripture, he preached Jesus. Again, listen, this is so basic and I'm saying it to people who understand and I'm thankful for it. But this is going to go out over the air. So I'm going to say it to some who may not. The most important thing that you can get from going to a Bible study is a Bible study. There it is. Very simple. Be very careful because many times we say, oh, I've heard that before. I already know that. But you know what? I've had times, I'll give you an example. I already know that. I've had conversations with people who've approached me after service and will ask me a question. And then I'll give the answer. And I have many times heard this response when I said, well, this is what the Bible says about that. I've had many times the response. I already know that. I already know that. And I look at them. And I give the response that Jesus gave. I'll say, if you know these things, blessed are you if you do them. It's not enough to know. The knowledge has to be translated into behavior. It's not enough to quote a scripture. If you want to know the meaning of it, make up your mind to obey it. That's how you gain spiritual knowledge. There have been those who speak concerning meat. Oh, I want more of the meat of the word. What is the meat of the word? Jesus told us. He said, my meat is to know the will of my Father and to do it. It's not simply knowing something. There are too many believers today who have notebooks filled with notes who have on the side of the margins of their Bible notes. The notes are in books and the notes are in the Bible, but the notes haven't been written on the tablets of the heart. And when the word is on the tablet of the heart, from the heart, you obey. But when you have it just in a notebook or in a margin, it's not changing your life. You need to. This is so basic. But we need to do what we know because it's one thing for me to say. It's another thing for me to do. And the challenge isn't to be able to say it. The challenge is to actually do it. And that is when God manifests himself to you because Jesus said, if you obey me, my Father and I will make our home with you and I will manifest myself to you. John 14, 21, that's what he does. He reveals himself to us through obedience. And that's so very important. And so they were questioning who is this? And they said, well, it's Messiah. You see, he preaches Jesus. Once again, that's been the strength of Calvary Ministries all along. The Bible, the entire Bible points us to Jesus Christ and we need to keep him with the forefront of all of our ministry. And that's why spending time in the Word is so important. Now, as we move to a conclusion here, as they went down verse 36, the road, they came to some water. So we asked one question who is this? Now we asked the second question, what is hindering me from being baptized? Somewhere on this road, as they went down this road they came, he came to faith in Christ. And as he was hearing this counsel and he heard about baptism, he said, I want to be baptized. Baptism is a picture of the new life that is promised to us by Jesus Christ. And indeed, we will be having a baptism for those who perhaps have yet to be water baptized and it'll be God willing, it'll be in June. But he's saying, I want to be fully identified with this Messiah who has been revealed in this passage of Scripture. But what is the requirement and notice the requirement to be baptized? Believe verse 37, with all your heart and you may. There's no such thing, by the way, as a part-time disciple. You know, we have part-time employees in our fellowship. It's okay to be a part-time employee somewhere, but you can never be a part-time disciple. I don't work part-time for Jesus. I don't work Sundays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays at conferences. That's not how it works. And by the way, that's not how it's ever worked. A disciple is somebody who picks up the cross daily and follows him. A disciple is an individual who has left things behind to pursue the one that matters. And it's a forever kind of relationship. And so, he's asking, what do I need to do? And here's your requirement. Do you believe with all your heart? If you believe with all your heart, you may. I believe, he said, Jesus Christ is the Son of God. I do believe. And so, verse 38, he commanded the chariot to stand still. Both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water, and he baptized him. And when they came out of the water, the spirit of the Lord caught Philip away so that the eunuch saw him no more. And he went on his way rejoicing. But Philip was found at Azotus. Passing through, he preached in all the cities till he came to Caesarea. And so, there was this miraculous thing that took place where God removed him immediately from his sight. And what was the result of that? And that miracle by itself is unbelievable. But the result was that this man, this Ethiopian, went on his way rejoicing. Why did he go on his way rejoicing? Because he got saved. Not because Philip was gone. See, people in this church go on their way rejoicing when I'm not here. No, that's not what he's speaking about. Now, it speaks about him going to Azotus. Azotus was 20 miles north of Gaza. It's a city that was once called Ashdod. And what he was doing is he was preaching in the cities, and he came up, all the way up, he's going up the coast into an area called Caesarea, which is right by Joppa, or Jaffa, in the Old Testament. Now, finally, nothing is heard of the Ethiopian again. Nothing. But there was a church father, Irenaeus. And Irenaeus said that this Ethiopian became a missionary to his fellow Ethiopians. That's a possibility. He got saved. And according to church historians and church fathers, this man who was saved became a conduit of salvation for others. So let's take that to heart. I was saved not to keep the gospel to myself. I was saved to give the gospel away to others. So were you. You may not be an evangelist, but you certainly are a witness. And people look at you to see what the gospel is all about. Please remember that always is so true. It is so true. I was sharing with some of the men on my staff just today, and we're talking about modeling ministry, about ministry. And I was saying to the men, you are a walking sermon. You are a visible representation of Jesus himself. People will look at your life before they listen to your words. Keep that in mind. Not a single one of us is perfect beginning with me throughout this entire church except for Marie. She told me to say that. None of us is perfect. Don't feel condemned. Please don't. Some do when I say these kinds of things. Well, that's it. You're preaching perfectionism. No, I'm not. Where's your grace? I'm a recipient of the grace of God. I'm certainly not bringing you under the law, but I do know what impacts people. Sincere faith in Jesus Christ, a real transformed life, an honest, real connection to God. That's what people see, and that's what speaks to them. And after you've earned their trust sometimes, and I'm talking about family and friends, after you've earned their trust by consistency in your walk, you may earn their ear to be able to share with them the gospel. Love your friends. Love your family. When it's possible, have a love for your coworkers and for your neighbors. When God gives you opportunity, be willing to share. Don't think that you have to give the entire gospel from Isaiah all the way through until, and then, hey, here's some water at the water fountain. What's hindering you from being baptized? I'm not saying that, though that would be cool. What I'm saying is wherever you go, you are a witness for Jesus Christ. Always remember that. And in a world filled with hypocrisy and a world filled with those who say one thing and do another, make up your mind that you're going to live consistently for Jesus Christ. There is nothing more valuable than living for Jesus and bringing people to the saving knowledge of God. Nothing more. Nothing. Nothing more beautiful.